Creating For A New Purpose

I’ve missed you all so much, and believe it or not, lately I’ve REALLY missed creating! Like.. A LOT!

I have a few estate sales on my calendar, but until then, I’ve just wanted to make something.

I guess God knew I was getting antsy, so He gave me something to do this week…

Working for a church has proved to be the greatest job in the world! I LOVE the people I work with and I LOVE the people who walk through the doors Sunday morning. I also LOVE that I can talk about God, pray, read my Bible, or listen to Christian music whenever I want…at work! It’s a great feeling!

This past Monday, during our staff meeting, we were talking about what kind of trophy we should get for the winners of our LifeGroup chili cook-off this past Wednesday. I piped up and mentioned that I had a friend who used to have an old Chili’s sign that we could probably buy. Everyone decided that would be a fun trophy, so I got right on it!

Unfortunately, I later found out that my friend had sold the sign. Now what?

So here I am Tuesday afternoon trying to figure out what we could use for a trophy instead. Then I had it! God has gifted me with the ability to create, what could I create instead?

That night I went home and pulled out a board I had sitting in the garage. I sat and stared at it for a while. Surely I could turn that board into a trophy of some kind!

I thought for a minute that I could paint a chili on it and cut it out of the wood, but then remembered that my husband wasn’t home and I had never used the saw before. Probably not a great idea.

I shaded the back like I did here. Once it was shaded, I positioned it on the board, traced it, and then painted inside the lines.

Once the chili was painted on, I did the same process with the letters.

Here is what it looked like before I painted inside the letters (please excuse the iPhone pics!)…

Later, I decided that it would look better with the letters painted in, so using my white paint pen, I painted the inside too.

That night, as a chili judge, I got the honor of tasting several bowls of chili. First of all, let me say, I have never been a food judge before, so I really didn’t know what I was in for! We had to rate the chili on its smell, taste, texture, consistency, and spice. I really didn’t understand why I couldn’t just rate it a 1-10 and be done, but it was definitely different and made really think about the food I was eating. I will say that I am not a spicy food kind of person, and one of the bowls about knocked my socks off!! I couldn’t stop coughing and my eyes were watering like crazy! Not nice people. Not nice.

I have NEVER tasted so many different kinds of chili. I am obviously not a food critic, or a chili connaisseur, after all I figured, chili is chili. Boy was I wrong! Some of our groups were over-the-top fancy! One of my favorites was one that had cornbread at the bottom, chili on top, and sour cream and cheddar cheese on top. YUM!

By the time I was done I starting to thing that I had no idea what chili was all about! I mean, I have seriously never seen chili made so many different ways!!

I had a blast and the groups had a great time!

As a furniture painter, I rarely got to see the people who bought my furniture, but this time, when our pastor pulled out my sign, everyone laughed and clapped I was overjoyed! They loved it!

Of course, the winners REALLY loved it!

For years, while I was teaching, I would pray that God would show me His will for me. I knew that teaching was not what I was supposed to be doing. I could feel it with everything in me! The problem was that I didn’t know WHAT God wanted me to do, so I continued teaching.

Then, when I quit teaching, I thought, now what? And The Rustic Pig was born, but something still didn’t feel right.

Now, it feels right. I have no doubt that I am where God wants me to be. The neat thing is that I can look back and see how God spent all that time molding me into what He needed me to be in order to do the job that I do now.

For example, I am in charge of our weekly newsletter and Facebook for our church. If I hadn’t spent a year blogging, I wouldn’t know how to do half of the things I need to do for those two platforms. Another example is that for years I helped and worked at our church in Dallas as a greeter and managed volunteers over the summer. Now, that’s the majority of my job… working with the greeters and the ushers. I LOVE it!

If you leave reading this today and get nothing out of it but this, then I will be happy… If you aren’t happy where you are right now, know that there is a good chance that God is making you restless. God has bigger and better plans for your future. Start praying about it now and watch how God starts to mold you into the person He want to use.

My name is Claire and I am behind the blog... The Rustic Pig. I am a wife, a mother to 2 boys, and I just might be addicted to Craigslist. I love to buy antiques, paint them, and give them a chance to be loved again! Please feel free to pull up a chair and stay for a while. If you ask a question or leave a comment, I will be sure to get back to you as soon as possible!

Comments

Love this, Claire! Being in the center of God’s will is the best place of all, but sometimes we have to do a lot of other things that are right at the time but eventually lead us to that place. I think it’s a place of constant discovery. You don’t just arrive. It’s all part of the journey! Love ‘ya, gal!

Great post. So encouraging. I miss your posts terribly! What a great job on theChili trophey sign. Good to hear how happy your job is making you 🙂 God is so very good! Looking forward to your next post (already).

Claire, I am so happy for you. What a fabulous opportunity! I know you are so right about God preparing us and nudging us in our journey for just the right moment. I have been a little lost with where I belong since we moved last year and this month have finally had the feeling of everything falling into place. Good luck in your journey.
~Tami Michel

Hi Claire, what a great job on the sigh. Happy to hear that you are loving your job. I haven’t really blogged too much for the past six months, because I’m still not in a home of my own. I’ve missed everyone and all of the creativity. I’ll keep checking on you from time to time. Take care,
Jeannie

Hi Claire!
So happy to hear about your new job AND you can continue to create! Hope all is well with you. We are moving into our new little farmhouse with a dogtrot in it within the next month. Would love for you to drop by IF you have the time! ha Congrats again. Keep on following His path! mm

I love it. Just when you think something isn’t going to work out, it usually does and when that something doesn’t work out the way you planed and you are sad it didn’t. Wait for it because it’s going to work out different and better than than you could ever have imagined.

The Lord knows what is needed for us all, and if you really think about what has happened in your circumstance and give it a chance, you will see and love Him for not giving you what you thought you wanted. Be thankful and always remember, you can’t do it without him and if you somehow end up somehow getting that something without it being His Will, you will not want it guaranteed.

About Me

My name is Claire and I am behind the blog... The Rustic Pig. I am a wife, a mother to 2 boys, and I just might be addicted to Craigslist. I love to buy antiques, paint them, and give them a chance to be loved again! Please feel free to pull up a chair and stay for a while. If you ask a question or leave a comment, I will be sure to get back to you as soon as possible!